Motherhood Redefined

Recently, I have been reminded that being a "mother" is so much more than simply birthing a child.  In my own life, I have lost two little ones due to miscarriage, birthed 3 little ones, and adopted 4 little ones.  The four that we adopted technically have another "mother" running around somewhere.  What does that make me?  Am I in competition with that mother?  Sometimes I feel that way.  Am I somehow "better" than her?  Am I "more" their mother than she was?  I don't honestly know.

I believe in my heart that the Lord brought these children to us.  Was that His plan all along or am I "plan B" for them?  It's weird thinking that you're "plan B."  I'd like to think that I was "plan A" but then if that were true, wouldn't I have given birth to them?  I don't know.  Wouldn't it have been God's plan for them to have stayed with their "original" parents and have grown up in a healthy home with them?  I struggle a little in how I should feel sometimes.  Of course I love them and will always provide for them, but will they ever FULLY feel like "my" children?  I certainly love them as MUCH as the ones I gave birth to, as far as the amount that I love them, but I don't feel the same stuff BACK from each of them.  I wonder if that ever comes.  I really do feel like two of them love me right back just like the 3 I gave birth to, but the other two, I'm just not sure.

At the same time as I've been sorting through the long term "what ifs" of my own family, my nephew's family is suddenly struck with strange "motherhood" issues of its own.  My nephew & his wife have two little boys and one has had some fairly serious medical issues, which ended up requiring surgery.  In the midst of all this, just a few days prior to the surgery, Lisa was struck with a seizure which completely erased all her memory of the last eleven years of her life.  This includes meeting my nephew and giving birth to the boys.  How is this mother, who is now, just seventeen in her own mind, supposed to be mommy to her 9 & 6 year old boys?

The time came for Macon's surgery and I was happy to see that Lisa came.  What struck my heart even more than her presence at the hospital, was her obvious resolution to be what Macon needed her to be throughout the surgery and recovery process.  There she was, completely lost and inexplicably overwhelmed, but she held him.  She whispered into his ear and rocked him.  She watched his unrecognizable face and found signals about what he needed.  She spoke love to him and was near to him as every "real" mother would be.  She didn't even know him.  She could just as easily have walked away with not so much as a tinge of guilt.  But this seventeen year old mind in a twenty eight year old body somehow knew deep down in her heart somewhere that a mother doesn't abandon her child.  So regardless of the fact that she had no memory or emotional attachment at this time, Lisa did what a "mother" would do.  She loved.  She comforted.  She mothered.  Selflessly.

That's exactly what our kids' original mother could not do.  She had memory of their births.  She knew them by face and name.  She remembered everything about "her" children, but she could not love them selflessly.  Then again, sometimes loving selflessly means that a mother gives up her child because she knows she is ill-equipped to handle motherhood.  Does that mother who painfully puts her baby up for adoption cease to become a mother?  Is she a bad mother for doing so?  Suddenly, motherhood looks different to me.

So this is what my mind could come up with:  Motherhood=providing God's best for your child, regardless of your feelings or what seems best for yourself.

I am so proud of Lisa.  My niece is my hero.  I know she is still struggling and this is just the beginning of this "new" motherhood journey that she's actually been on for nine years, but I've never seen such heroism and resolve in another woman's eyes than I did in hers that day she held that "stranger" in her arms in the hospital. Her child.  Her baby she didn't even know.  It was God's best for Macon to have his mommy hold him through that, regardless of how his mommy felt at the time.  She DID IT!  I know that there will be days where she will glow with her "new" title as Mommy and other days she will want to run away and hide from it.  I know that there will be days that she feels like a great mom and days that she feels like a terrible mom.

I know this because every mom feels that way sometimes.  Memories or not.  Every mom feels like running sometimes.  Every mom feels like a failure sometimes.  Every mom feels helpless at times.  Every mom feels alone sometimes.  Every mom feels suffocated sometimes.  Every mom cries.  Every mom feels pain.  Real moms stick it out.  Real moms push through to the end. Because there are those other times...Every mom feels like a champion every now and then.  Every mom feels like a hero at least once in her child's life.

Lisa, you ARE a hero.  You're the REAL THING, baby!  You're God's "plan A" for Gavin & Macon.  Don't give up.  You've only just begun this wonderfully painful and joyous journey of motherhood...redefined.